Strange Confessions: A Realization Occurs

Strange Confessions: My best friend from High School and I signed up at the Salt Lake Community College so we could take classes together, and when we took the English placement essay test, I was placed in the remedial, and he, the advanced.

Writing, or more specifically making up stories was one of the things I always enjoyed doing. I would tell my little sister bedtime stories that was stream of consciousness style, much like my singing and poetry is now, er… then, like… forever. There were lots of times that I thought I could have been a writer. But, like so many things I dreamed of in my life I never thought I could be good enough. What? Where did that come from? How did I always believe that? My parents weren’t necessarily discouraging, but I never really remember them encouraging me to do whatever I wanted to do. I see movies where the child is discouraged because he failed at something and the parent gives a little speech and tells them they can do anything they set their mind to. I never got that speech, and I failed… a lot. I don’t want to blame my parents for my lack of direction in my life, but there is something to it, perhaps. The time I remember wanting to be a veterinarian was the only time I remember getting some type of encouragement. We’d go to the zoo and some monkey would respond to my face and my mom would oooh and ahhh, and tell me how good I was with animals. I thought, “Yeah, I am good with animals.” I could be a veterinarian. But, somewhere along the way, I lost interest. As always. There is a saying, “Jack of all trades, master of none.” That’s me, although more like, “Jack of much useless knowledge, master of none.”

Whoa, whoa, whoa! We’re getting way off subject here. This is a Strange Confession about me and my best high school buddie, let’s call him RT. Well, I was the reader of the both of us, and he was the music guy. I was the hiker, he was the dragged along. I was the eater, he sometimes ate food. Although it may seem like I’m pointing out the differences here, which I guess I am, we were very similar. We were both very sarcastic. We both enjoyed heavy metal. We both enjoyed sci-fi and horror films. I’m trying to think of more similarities, but I can’t really. In fact some of our similarities eventually became the things which may have started to divide us.

You can’t expect best friends to be exactly alike in all ways. But there is a point here. I wanted to create, in the form of stories, and he wanted to do music. He is still very much into music and he actually has a self published book out, in the style of H.P. Lovecraft. I am proud of being a friend of someone who has remained true to his beliefs, enjoyments, and talents. Although I completely disagree with his beliefs and enjoyments now. He is the friend that I have talked about in previous Strange Confessions that is openly hostile to anyone that has a religious belief, especially Christian. When I first became Christian, I asked him what he thought of it and he told me that he always thought I’d take a path like that. It makes me think now what he meant by that. We were both raised Catholic and we both were in various ways rebellious against the whole system. We would eat, much to the chagrin of his mother, pepperoni on Fridays during lent (gasp). If you didn’t know, you can’t eat meat on the Fridays leading up to lent. I think he might have seen it when we were forced to take religious classes together, for those Catholic children who weren’t going to a Catholic school. I think I remember his saying something about that.

Either way, we had grown very distant after I had met my future wife. The last, largest amount of time we spent together was a couple of years before I got married. We took a trip to Houston, Texas, where his brother lived. We drove up to Waco too, where my brother lived then. We also spent a few nights in a beach house on Galveston Island. During the drive to Waco, I drove him completely insane by playing the only They Might Be Giants tape I had. He was very patient with me, and he was one of the few people who I don’t enjoy teasing. So it wasn’t on purpose that I did this, it’s just that I couldn’t stand what he listened to. It made me depressed. He listened/listens to death metal and the like. To me it’s just noise and screaming, and just depressing. We just about killed each other in the beach house. Our only salvation was walking on the beach at night. The ocean was warm down there and I just enjoy walking beaches, as far as I can. We went to places he wanted to go; metal record shops and such. We went where I wanted; places where I could eat something. But this vacation was the bells ringing the eventual doom of our relationship. We were really growing apart. It was a dreary realization. I knew that friends grew apart when one finds the love of his life and the other takes the single path, not, perhaps, by choices of his own. But it was inevitable. I still like RT and wish that we could sit together and talk about old times………. Perhaps that is my problem. *Realization occurs* None of my best friends really want to dwell in the past. I find the discovery of who I became through the experiences I had to be the best remembrances of me. … Is that why I like writing this? Is that why it is so rare to have more than three friends like these writings? and rarely comment? Do I need to change? I feel an inexpressible hollowness. Do they just humor me?

Who cares?! I enjoy writing and remembering. Perhaps that is a quality desirable in me. I enjoy it. …. No, no, no. Here it is. It wasn’t the experiences, it was the relationships. I am so scared of people rejecting me that I touch and feel them out, or I just bear all to make possible the rejection they could have for me quicker. “If you want a relationship with me,” I say, “then by golly I’m going to show you who I am. So that if you reject me it can be quick.” I don’t bear this facebook thing easily, but I’m trying. If you aren’t ready for who I am just leave. I’d rather you go now then lead me on and say it’s too much later, or be fake and just accept and go right on by me day in and day out.

That’s me. I’m open. So what? Like it or lump it. What does that mean anyway? (Here’s the part where I turn the serious stuff back into comedy so I can blame you when you leave.) I mean: “lump it”? That’s so confoundingly disturbing I have to see a cat in pajamas right now.

Thank you very much for reading my blog. It’s nice to know that you find the blog interesting. I hope to be writing more on this blog soon. Stay tuned fellow blogger for more blogging from this blog that I blog on.
Sincerely,
Blogger…er, I mean Stranger
😉